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The Haravatat student quarters are dull in every way— plain wooden doors, clean white walls, bland grey carpet that’s not quite adorning the floors. On all counts it should have been the most depressing corner of the Akademiya, but for some reason some architect from ages ago had decided to add a floor-to-ceiling stained glass window around the quarters’ western border, making the long hallway feel like the most magical hidden corner of Sumeru instead— especially at this hour and this time of year, when the sunset feels slowest and the whole world looks like it’s stuck in a held breath, waiting for it.
It’s so unfair, Kaveh thinks, that Haravatat of all Darshans should get this spot.
And that of all people, it’s the ones known for dismissing beauty in favour of practicality who should get to have this view: The sun, taking its sweet time setting over the city. Its golden rays, slipping through the glass window and casting an abstract masterpiece of light against the blank walls.
It’s so unfair, and it’s beautiful, and it’s right here that he meets Alhaitham for the first time.
Later, Kaveh would think there’s a metaphor in there somewhere. It all feels like foreshadowing, at least. He has always believed that the universe likes to give him little clues, and whenever he looks back to this day, it seems so full of them.
Here, a golden sunset. There, a boy.
It seems so obvious now, but it would take him years to understand just what they mean.
🌅
Kaveh is sitting slumped against the wall next to a nondescript door in a hall full of nondescript doors that he only recognises because of the faint scuff mark in the corner made by his own shoes a few nights ago. He’s got his knees drawn to himself, his cheek resting against one arm, his fingers tapping restlessly against the carpeted floor.
His boyfriend should have been here an hour ago.
Well— calling him a boyfriend is maybe a stretch, considering that they have only gone on three dates and haven’t really talked about what this thing between them is just yet. But Kaveh feels good about the word. And the guy. He’s handsome, he’s smart, he’s sweet, and yes, he’s Haravatat (blech) but Kaveh can overlook that deal breaker. He doesn’t dare say it out loud, but… he kind of feels like he’s the one.
There’s a sound of heavy footsteps to his right, making him instantly raise his head— ‘Finally!’ at the tip of his tongue, but the smile that’s slowly starting to form on his lips gets stopped short when he sees that it’s a stranger who has just arrived.
It’s another guy, a little shorter than Kaveh but having the illusion of looking taller due to his robe falling short way above his ankles. Kaveh decides he’s probably a freshman. Aside from looking like he’s grown out of his uniform in a matter of weeks, there’s the unkempt grey hair almost falling into his eyes, the round cheeks that have not been hollowed out by the Akademiya’s rigorous schedules just yet, and the most telltale sign— the towering stack of books in his arms. Kaveh hasn’t had to borrow that many books from the House of Daena in one night since his first year introductory courses.
The guy has now stopped just a step away from where he’s sitting and is instead just standing there and staring down at him, face expressionless except for a tiny hint of confusion in his eyes. “Who are you?” he asks, and the voice comes out gruff but awkward.
“Oh, I’m just waiting for—” Kaveh pauses halfway through trying to explain, caught off-guard by the unimpressed look on the guy’s face, like he’s already done with this conversation before Kaveh can even manage to complete a sentence. He remembers his boyfriend ranting about that exact expression just the other night.
(“My new roommate always has this look in his eye like he thinks he’s above everyone,” Kaveh remembers him saying, as he thought deep inside— “Well, don’t you all Haravatat look like that?”)
Kaveh thinks he gets what he means now, though. “You must be Akim’s roommate,” he says, smiling despite the brimming hospitality in the atmosphere. He braces his hands against the floor to push himself up to standing, dusting them off the back of his robe before offering one to the guy in front of him. “I’m Kaveh—”
“Senior Akim is out at the tavern with his friends,” the guy interrupts him, not even sparing a glance to Kaveh’s outstretched hand and sidestepping him instead to get to the door. “I don’t expect him to be back until midnight.”
“Ugh.” Kaveh doesn’t know what exactly he scoffs at— the ignored handshake, or the statement about his boyfriend’s whereabouts. Surely, this guy is mistaken? He has just spoken with Akim this morning before his first class, and they both clearly agreed that Kaveh would meet him at his quarters after his classes ended for the day before heading out to dinner together. “That can’t be, he was supposed to meet me here an hour ago,” he says, hating how defensive his voice sounds as his shunned hand falls to his side.
The guy pauses in inserting his key into the lock and looks back at him. “Well, I ran into him an hour ago and he said, ‘I will be at the tavern with my friends, so don’t expect me to be back until midnight.’”
Kaveh purses his lips and tries not to show the shame slowly crawling up his skin. Maybe Akim just forgot. Or maybe he just got roped into it against his will and is even now trying to escape his friends, knowing that Kaveh is waiting for him. Maybe— maybe this is all just a mistake. Kaveh takes a deep breath and forces a smile again. “Well, do you mind if I wait for him?”
“Do what you want.” The guy shrugs and finally turns the key, nudging the door open with his arm that’s carrying his books. Kaveh makes a move to offer help as he follows him inside, but just one step in and the guy is snapping his head back at him, brows furrowing in confusion. “Hold on, you didn’t mean you wanted to wait inside, did you?”
“Uh—” Duh? Kaveh blinks at him. “Where else would I wait for him?”
“I can’t let you in,” the guy replies, not answering the question at all. Never mind the fact that Kaveh is technically already ‘in’ with one foot past the threshold.
“Why not?”
“I don’t know you.”
Kaveh crosses his arms, the shame he’s feeling earlier slowly being replaced with irritation at this display of stubbornness. Ugh. Freshmen. “But Akim does, and this is his room, too.”
“Well, senior Akim is not here, is he? Besides, that’s precisely why I can’t let you in. It’s his room, too. How do I know you’re not just lying about knowing him? I’ve never met you before.”
Kaveh scoffs. “I’m his—” he catches himself at the last second, biting his tongue at the word boyfriend that was about to slip out of his mouth. “Friend.”
“He has never talked about a friend from the Kshahrewar before,” the guy says, looking over at the emblem in Kaveh’s uniform. His tone is emotionless, but Kaveh could have sworn there was some condescension in those two words.
“Are you really making me wait out in the hall? It’s so—” Dull. Boring. Scratchy. Lonely. But again Kaveh has to bite down the words. At the back of his mind, he can almost hear the well-meaning taunts from his old ‘friends’ that are never any less hurtful despite the supposedly good-natured intention.
You’re too clingy, and no one likes that. If you were just a little less desperate, you might actually get someone to stay for once. Kaveh— always desperate for company. So afraid to be lonely that he can’t even bear waiting alone in a deserted hallway for a few hours. Too clingy that he can’t even let a not-quite-boyfriend have his own night out with friends, even though he’s just sticking to a prior plan.
He shakes the thoughts away from his head, taking a deep breath and slowly stepping away from the door. “Nevermind.”
The guy says nothing, just closes it in his face, not sparing him a single glance.
Fifteen minutes pass in complete silence in the empty hallway, and Kaveh is starting to consider just how stupid this whole thing is. What’s his plan here, anyway? Wait until midnight? Hope that Akim somehow remembers him and stumbles home before that? They did not have anything special planned for tonight, anyway— just dinner, and what’s stopping Kaveh from doing that on his own?
He doesn’t know, either.
It’s stupid, and uncomfortable, and lonely, waiting here for someone who he’s not sure would ever even show up. Earlier the hallway was at least busy, with most students returning to their rooms after their last classes for the day. Now it’s eerily quiet, everyone either already tucked in for a whole night of studying or still out and enjoying the city.
Kaveh is just about to stand up and go back to his own quarters at Kshahrewar — might as well just spend this time having an early start on his semester projects — when the first glimpse of the sunset hits the huge stained-glass window to his left.
He feels time stand still as his breath escapes him in an awed sigh, watching the light dance and bounce on the previously drab white walls around him, painting everything in golden fire.
It’s…
Unfair.
The Kshahrewar quarters are beautiful— the walls are painted with a lively mural added to over the years by every student who ever lived there, the doors filled with personalised signs and hanging trinkets, the hallways alive with laughter and conversation and art. But compared to this sight in front of him… it’s unfair. Why does Haravatat get to have this holy light?
It feels almost sacrilegious, having it shine on an empty hallway with no one but Kaveh to admire it.
The door beside him slowly creaks open, taking Kaveh’s attention away from the view of the setting sun for a moment. He looks up and sees the guy from earlier — Akim’s roommate — staring down at him again with an unreadable look in his eyes.
Kaveh realises he’s changed out of his Akademiya robe into a more casual white shirt and black pants, and he’s carrying a book in one hand. He stares at Kaveh for a long stretched out second, saying nothing, and Kaveh sits in silence too as he watches the guy finally move, walking around him and settling into a cross-legged position against the wall just a few feet away from him, before opening his book and casually starting to read.
“Uh. What are you doing?”
“I’m obviously reading,” the guy replies, not looking up from his book.
Kaveh resists the urge to scoff at him. The sunset is making the moment feel like a dream that no one in Sumeru ever gets to have, and doing such a mundane, petty thing such as scoffing feels like a grave disrespect to the whole thing.
“I mean,” he says in an almost hushed tone, trying to keep his composure. “Why are you reading out here in the hall?”
The guy finally looks up from his book and turns to stare at him again. Kaveh meets his gaze, the artist in him fixating on his eyes and how they are such a curious colour— teal a shade darker than the highlights in his grey hair, striking orange irises that almost rival the light from the window softly landing on his face. Kaveh’s fingers twitch on his side, as if by instinct, itching for a brush to capture this exact palette.
Those teal eyes look away before Kaveh can memorise them, though, and he is just starting to think he won’t ever get an answer to his question, when the guy speaks up quietly, gaze now back on his book. “I don’t let even my own acquaintances inside our room without discussing it with senior Akim first. At the start of the semester, we agreed to only have people over upon prior agreement from both parties.”
Kaveh blinks at him. Faintly he wonders about how just a few nights ago, he was in the room alone with Akim, and how he’s pretty sure this poor freshman has no idea about it, or else he would have known who Kaveh is. The thought is almost funny, that it takes him a few seconds before he realises what the guy has just said. “Wait. You can’t let me in… so you’re out here in the hall with me instead.”
The freshman purses his lips, as if it’s a discomfort hearing the whole situation spelled out so plainly like that. For the first time tonight, Kaveh’s lips quirk up in a genuine smile.
“What’s your name?” he asks.
The light is still dancing around them— a slow, slow dance as beyond the window the sun steadily makes its way over the horizon. The guy turns to look at him again, half his face in silhouette now, still with that unreadable expression in his eyes.
“Alhaitham,” he says.
Alhaitham, Kaveh echoes in his head. In a way, it hasn’t stopped echoing since.
“Why are you here, Alhaitham?”
“You looked like you could use some company,” Alhaitham replies, straightforward— like it’s just the fact of the matter, and not the words Kaveh didn’t know he’s been longing to hear for what feels like all of his life before this moment.
He would break up with Akim the next day, not even letting him get a word in about just how sorry he was. And then he’d forget his name a few months after that. Another few months more and Kaveh would even forget why he broke it off in the first place— forget every inconsequential thing about that night.
All except for the name of the boy who offered him company right when he was feeling most alone, quietly reading in the sunset light.
🌅
It takes a year before Kaveh meets Alhaitham again, this time late into the night at Lambad’s Tavern.
Kaveh doesn’t recognise him at first, not when he only ever saw him once, and certainly not in a server’s uniform. But when he finally does, and he realises his current situation — alone at a table, nursing a bottle of wine for the past hour or so, looking miserable and clearly waiting for someone — all Kaveh can do is groan. What is this guy, the harbinger of failed dates or something?
“Senior Kaveh.”
Kaveh looks up and has to blink a few times against his slightly cloudy vision. Though even without the wine, he thinks he still won’t recognise Alhaitham right away like this.
The podgy freshman boy he met last year in the Haravatat quarters is no more, and standing in front of his table is a much, much taller man, the buttons of his white server uniform straining against a well-defined chest and toned biceps. If it weren’t for his eyes— still the same curious teal that Kaveh remembers, and the orange irises that shine bright even under the dim indoor lighting of the tavern — Kaveh would doubt this is the same Alhaitham at all.
Still, he picks his jaw up from the floor and stupidly asks, “Alhaitham?”
Alhaitham doesn’t say anything, just unceremoniously unties the apron around his waist and sits down at the seat across from Kaveh— then honest to god pulls out a book from out of nowhere and starts reading.
Kaveh has to laugh.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m obviously reading,” Alhaitham replies, barely looking up.
Kaveh bites his lip, trying not to smile at the memory of those exact words from a year ago, but Alhaitham doesn’t seem to remember. Or if he does, he doesn’t seem to find any humour in it at all.
“I didn’t know you worked here. Also, are you allowed to— uh, do that while working?”
Kaveh doesn’t go to Lambad’s that often, which is ironic considering that it’s the closest tavern to the Akademiya, but it’s precisely this reason that his group of friends always likes to venture farther to other establishments outside the city. It’s no fun getting wasted on a school night when your professors could be just at the next table over. If he’d known Alhaitham worked here, well—
“Having a part-time job challenges my time management skills, and this particular one helps me hone my ability to socialise outside peers from the Akademiya, which I suppose is a good thing to have in one’s arsenal. Not to mention, I get to earn Mora while essentially conducting a personal experiment.” Kaveh raises an eyebrow. This guy sure loves breaking things down into logical chunks, huh? “Also, my shift is technically over now. And even if it’s not, Lambad does let me catch up on my reading sometimes on slow nights, so yes— I am allowed to do this while working.”
“Not at a customer’s table though, I’m sure?” Kaveh says, laughing a little.
Alhaitham purses his lips, and if Kaveh didn’t know any better, he’d say Alhaitham looks amused, too. “You looked like you could use some company.”
“Hah.”
Kaveh groans at the reminder and gently lets his head fall to the table. If he had a Mora for every time this guy catches him getting stood up by a date, he’d have two Mora— which is not a lot, but it’s fucking embarrassing that it happened twice now. “Were you watching me the whole night?”
“Don’t flatter yourself, I was just doing my job and you happened to be in my line of sight.”
Kaveh looks up and shoots him a half-hearted glare. “Why didn’t you say hi earlier?”
“You’re not in my area, and—” Alhaitham pauses, looking him up and down with a curious intensity that has Kaveh almost fidgeting in his seat. “I didn’t recognise you at first.”
“Hah! I didn’t recognise you at first. Look at you!” Kaveh lets out before he can think, gesturing vaguely at Alhaitham, then realising what he’s doing and immediately putting his hand back down. “Uh. I mean—”
“I have gotten more buff in the past year, I’m aware.”
That’s an understatement. Kaveh kind of misses his round freshman cheeks.
They fall into silence after that, Kaveh not quite knowing what to say next, and Alhaitham— well, Kaveh’s assuming this is just his default state. For a while, he just watches him go back to his book, amused at how Alhaitham can seemingly pull out a book and read under any lighting and in any atmosphere— a sunset in an empty hallway, dim yellow lighting in a noisy tavern.
Fondness suddenly rises up in Kaveh’s chest, and he looks away and takes a huge sip of his wine before something else joins it.
A few minutes ago, he wanted nothing more than to go back to his room and finish this bottle that he spent all of his allowance on and cry himself to sleep. Now, he thinks he kind of wants to stretch this night forever, if not for a few more hours, just like that slow sunset a year ago.
Alhaitham just sits across from him and reads his book, putting it down every now and then when Kaveh, a bit more loosened up from the alcohol as the night deepens, decides to voice out random out of pocket questions. Alhaitham indulges him with quick no-nonsense replies every time. He doesn’t ask if Kaveh’s waiting for someone (Kaveh no longer is, anyway) or makes a remark, teasing or not, about how they’re meeting under the same discomfiting circumstance again.
By the next day and through the haze of a nasty hangover, Kaveh will remember it not as the night he got stood up on another stupid date, but as the night he made a really good friend.
🌅
Kaveh doesn’t realise tears have formed in his eyes until they’re free-falling down his cheeks, faster than his hands could wipe them away.
Just… wow. That must have been the single most beautiful piece of music he has ever heard in his life.
“That was…” he trails off, a little out of breath, feeling almost silly at how hard he’s crying from a simple lyre solo. He slowly turns his head to look at his date, hoping to lock eyes with him and see the same emotions raging inside him mirrored in his eyes.
What a romantic thing, Kaveh thinks, to have experienced a life-changing performance together. Right in the middle of the Grand Bazaar on an otherwise ordinary night, surrounded by people of Sumeru City from all walks of life. To get lost in their own world, for a moment, even amidst the crowd, to—
His date doesn’t even notice Kaveh is looking at him for a good few seconds before he blinks and turns to him.
“Sorry, I— did you say something? I was looking up restaurants in the Akasha to see where we could eat tonight.”
Kaveh imagines his heart like a balloon, the words a tiny prick of a needle completely deflating him of air. “I—” He doesn’t even know where to start.
I just heard the most beautiful lyre solo in all of Teyvat and it would have been nice if you squeezed my hand through it to let me know you understood it, too.
I thought it was the most romantic thing, stopping to watch a street performer in the middle of the Grand Bazaar under a star-filled sky with a person you like, but you weren’t even listening.
“You didn’t reserve a restaurant?” You didn’t even notice I was just crying.
His date shrugs, nonchalant. “I thought we could just decide in the moment. You never know what you’ll crave for, anyway. There’s a Mondstadt specialty place that just opened right by Treasures Street, and it seems nice. Pretty cheap, too. Let’s go?” He tugs on Kaveh’s arm, but Kaveh gently shrugs him off.
“You said this was a special night.” He hates how his voice sounds— weak and defeated, like all the life from the music earlier had gone out of him just like that, in the span of a few minutes.
“Well—” His date furrows his brows, a hint of irritation crossing his eyes. “It’s special because I get to spend it with you.”
Kaveh feels hands rest on his shoulders and come up to his face, cupping his cheeks, but he barely registers any of it.
Suddenly, in the middle of the evening crowd in the Grand Bazaar, with another’s arms holding him, he feels so so alone that it aches.
And that’s when he sees him.
All the way at the other side of the street, his cape blending in with the night and the dark green cloth draped over the fruit stalls. You looked like you could use some company.
Kaveh almost cries again at the sense of relief that rushes through him at the sight of those teal eyes and sunset irises looking straight at him. If he’d been feeling poetic, he’d maybe even say this is what it must feel like to have a guardian angel.
Hah— Alhaitham, a guardian angel. Now that’s a funny thought.
Before he knows it, he’s suddenly giggling— and then it’s full-bodied laughter, uncontrollably slipping out of his lips, shaking his shoulders and his arms and making him clutch his stomach. His date tentatively lets him go and looks at him in confusion, probably wondering if Kaveh has gone mad. Maybe he has.
“I… I have to go,” Kaveh manages to let out in between bouts of laughter. “I just saw a friend.”
“What? But we’re just about to go to dinner—”
“I’m not really hungry yet.”
“You said you were starving thirty minutes ago.”
“Ahh, how feelings change.” He starts walking to cross the street, waving a hand behind him and not looking back. “Have a nice life.”
“What the hell?”
Kaveh doesn’t hear what he says next.
Alhaitham is looking at him with a raised brow and an amused quirk on his lips as he approaches. “Hello.”
“Have you had dinner yet?” Kaveh asks.
“Did you just ditch your date?”
Kaveh shrugs, dripping nonchalance. Or maybe just feigning it. Later, back in his room, maybe he’ll cry about it. For now, though, the only thing on his mind is dinner. He really is starving. “Figured I’ll do the ditching for a change.”
Alhaitham doesn’t laugh, but Kaveh sees the telltale way he purses his lips and the single snort of air through his nose and a faint shake in his shoulders. For some reason, this feels more of an achievement to get out of him than proper laughter. “I haven’t eaten yet,” he replies to Kaveh’s earlier question. “What are you craving?”
“Anything but a Mondstadt dish.”
Alhaitham raises an eyebrow but doesn’t press further. Kaveh has never been more grateful to have him in his life.
It’s a strange friendship, what they have. When Kaveh thinks too hard about it, he doesn’t even know why or how they’ve started a friendship at all since that night at Lambad’s. They have no common interests, except maybe the pursuit of knowledge but that’s a given for everyone at the Akademiya. Besides, the way they view knowledge and its pursuit are so completely different that they can’t talk about it without starting an argument— and they’ve started plenty, just ask any unfortunate soul who happens to be in the House of Daena at the same time as their weekly study sessions. Which are strange in their own right, considering that they share no common classes being from different Darshans. Or used to, at least. This semester, they decided to take two free electives together seemingly just to have more things to argue about.
It’s— strange. How it’s only been a few months but Alhaitham has managed to completely worm his way into Kaveh’s life. Or how Kaveh has completely wormed his way into Alhaitham’s life— that’s certainly how Alhaitham would put it.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” Kaveh asks as they start walking in no particular direction. Or more accurately, he’s walking in no particular direction and just following Alhaitham who probably already thought of a destination in mind the moment Kaveh mentioned dinner.
“I came to listen to my favourite lyre solo.”
Kaveh pauses in his tracks, staring incredulously at his junior. “Your what?”
Alhaitham stops walking as well and looks back at him. “My favourite lyre solo, did you not get to listen to it earlier?” He lets out a disappointed sigh. “The busker performs it on Tuesdays fortnightly, but only a handful stops and listens. Everyone’s busy flitting from stall to stall or caught up in conversation that it fades into background noise, which is such a shame—”
“I didn’t know you listened to music!” Kaveh squeaks out stupidly, hating the way his heart is beating faster and faster at every word out of Alhaitham’s mouth.
Alhaitham frowns at him. “This is not just for blocking out noise, you know?”
Kaveh follows where he’s gesturing at— at the green-gold headphones currently wrapped around his neck, noise-cancelling ones that Alhaitham started wearing everywhere and all the time a few weeks ago. He hasn’t even noticed Alhaitham had slipped it off his ears.
“I did listen to it,” Kaveh looks down and says softly, almost like a chastised child. “It was beautiful, and it was my first time ever hearing it, you know I don’t usually go to the Grand Bazaar, and the few times I find myself there, I’m not exactly sober—” The irony isn’t lost on Kaveh that it’s him who’s feeling like he has to defend himself and his appreciation of beautiful music to Alhaitham.
Instead of giving him hell for it, though, Alhaitham simply hums and says, “It does something to a tired soul, no?”
Kaveh feels himself smile.
He looks up at Alhaitham, and can’t help but smile wider at the thought that he has to look up at him now, finding that his junior is already looking back at him, a rare but small smile on his face, too. “Yeah,” Kaveh agrees, the word coming out more like a reverent whisper amidst the busy crowd. “Yeah, it does.”
🌅
Somewhere along the way, Alhaitham drops the “senior” whenever he addresses Kaveh, and Kaveh forgets Alhaitham was ever that freshman boy who taught him how to enjoy his own company. Somewhere along the way, Kaveh gets to know him like he hasn’t gotten to know anyone else, to the point that he can probably write a whole book, an Alhaitham for Dummies, if you will, and he imagines Alhaitham can write double the number of pages about him in return.
Somewhere along the way, Alhaitham becomes his best friend.
“How did you survive so long without me?” Alhaitham tells rather than asks him as he wrangles Kaveh’s long blond hair into a braid. The way he says it is dripping with sarcasm, but Kaveh does wonder the same thing sometimes. It’s like he can’t even remember what his life was like before Alhaitham got in it by some twist of fate. Not that he’ll ever admit that out loud.
“I’ve done my own hair just fine before you, you know,” he huffs out.
“And yet you ask me to do it for you for every single date.”
“Because you do it better!” Kaveh admits begrudgingly, pouting at the mirror. He’s not above some flattery if it makes Alhaitham do his bidding.
“And thus proving my point.” Alhaitham steps back to survey his work, and then comes closer again to gently card his hand through Kaveh’s hair— his special technique in leaving it just the right amount of artfully messy. Kaveh’s pout turns into a small smile as he lets out a contented hum at the feeling.
“Gods, you’re just like a cat.”
He grins at Alhaitham through the mirror. “Meow.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.” Alhaitham rolls his eyes, but Kaveh could swear there’s the beginning of a smile forming on his lips before he turns around.
“Okay,” Kaveh says, turning around in his rotating chair as well. “You go to the Puspa Cafe in half an hour and if I’m smiling, you just… order a slice of cake on my tab or whatever— just a slice! And if I’m not, come up to me with an excuse and get me out of there.”
Alhaitham turns back to him and gives him a deadpan look.
“—and please nothing about my dog being rushed to the Bimarstan this time? I tell everyone I’m a cat person.”
“You are utterly ridiculous,” Alhaitham says, crossing his arms.
“I’m serious!”
Alhaitham lets out a long-suffering sigh, uncrossing his arms again. Kaveh is a little entertained by the motion. This guy does nothing but read books and ends up with a finer physique than him. It’s so unfair.
“Fine,” Alhaitham relents. “This isn’t the first time you’ve made me do this, anyway. I know the drill.”
“You act like this is such a huge chore. Like you don’t enjoy driving away my bad dates with absurd excuses?”
Something crosses Alhaitham’s expression then— too fast for Kaveh to read into it, there and then gone just as quickly. Just like that, Alhaitham’s eyes are back to their signature unimpressed stare, leaving Kaveh to wonder if he’s just seeing things.
“Has it never occurred to you that I could have other things to do with my evenings, too?”
Kaveh blinks at him.
Huh.
The truth is, it has never occurred to him. Alhaitham has always seemed content staying in when everyone is out, and Kaveh has never known any other hobby of his aside from going through books at the speed of light. “Well…” he says, a little embarrassed now at never having realised. “…Do you?”
Alhaitham sighs again. “I was planning to finish this book, but I can do that just as well at Puspa.”
When Kaveh just remains staring at him, not quite convinced, or maybe simply guilty at being so selfish, Alhaitham rolls his eyes and practically shoos him away. “I was just kidding about having plans. Go. Enjoy your date.”
“Gods, I hope so,” Kaveh replies, almost automatically.
It’s a routine for them at this point, a script for every night Alhaitham sends him off to another date in search of the elusive the one. But this time, the words come out a little half-hearted out of his mouth. He looks back once before he leaves his room, feeling a strange pang in his chest at the sight of Alhaitham already settling into his chair and starting to read his book, looking just at home at Kaveh’s quarters as he is at his own.
Kaveh gently closes the door behind him and tries to muster up enthusiasm for the guy waiting for him at Puspa Cafe, but what his mind calls up are images of the nights Alhaitham has had to bail him out instead— nights when they end up just aimlessly strolling around the city, Alhaitham holding in laughter at his drunken ass making a ruckus and cursing out every single man who has ever dared break his heart. Nights when they would sleep over at each other’s rooms, playing card games or picking a random topic to debate over just for the hell of it. Kaveh imagines slipping into his cosy pyjamas with sleeves that reach way past his hands, and suddenly hates this scratchy shirt he’s wearing, with a neckline that’s maybe a little too low for the evening chill now that he thinks about it.
He takes a deep breath and forces himself to take a step, and another, and another until he’s out of the Akademiya and into the lively streets of the city— a part of him hoping this would end up being a bad date just so he can go home.
🌅
Kaveh has never had the inclination to wonder about Alhaitham’s own… love life before, maybe precisely because of the lack thereof.
There’s too many of the type in the Akademiya, in Haravatat most of all: scholars too devoted in their research to make time for frivolous things such as dating and— god forbid, love. For some reason, Kaveh must have just always unconsciously assumed that Alhaitham’s the same way. He’s certainly never expressed interest in anyone before, and Kaveh’s far too caught up in his own colourful dating life to pry. At least, not until… now.
“You’re going on a date?”
“You’ve repeated that five times now.”
Has he? Kaveh is just struggling to make sense of the statement. Alhaitham… going on a date. It’s like saying Alhaitham is finally conceding an argument. Something Kaveh has always thought is virtually impossible.
“Seeing as how I’ve always helped you get ready through numerous dates of your own, I figured this is the perfect time for you to return the favour. I have no idea what I should wear.”
“I—”
“Well, I suppose that’s untrue. I do have an idea on what I should wear, but I’m not sure if it’s fitting for a date.” There’s a begrudging undertone to his words, like it pains him to admit a lack of knowledge on something, even something like this.
Alhaitham… going on a date.
Something about the thought pokes something ugly deep inside Kaveh’s chest. “Who is she?”
Alhaitham tilts his head and considers him, seemingly amused at the question. “He, actually.”
“Oh.”
Huh. He’s never even known that Alhaitham swings that way. Gods, how does Kaveh not know so many things about the guy he calls his best friend? (Not to his face, but still.) It’s not like he’s always assumed Alhaitham was straight, either. It’s just… Kaveh has never really thought about it. And now that the thought is at the forefront of his mind, the ugly thing in his chest seems to grow bigger and bigger by the minute.
Alhaitham is going on a date. With a man. Alhaitham likes men. Why…
Why not him?
Oh.
Oh. Fuck? Kaveh suddenly shoots up from where he’s perched on Alhaitham’s bed. Fuck. Alhaitham has gotten a single room this year and Kaveh has always envied the much bigger space he now has, but right now it feels suffocating all the same. What the fuck was that out of pocket thought? He doesn’t like Alhaitham that way… does he? He’s never been timid when it comes to these things, so surely if he felt anything for Alhaitham (which he didn’t) he would have already made a move by now. Surely, Kaveh can’t have been this dense and blind to his own feelings. Surely…
“Why?” he croaks out.
Alhaitham frowns. “What kind of question is that? What do you mean, why?”
Why not me why not me why not me why not m— “Why… you’ve never seemed interested in, you know, dating and— and all that stuff before. Why now?” And why not me why not me.
Kaveh fully expects Alhaitham to laugh at the absurd question, but instead something strange but not unfamiliar crosses his expression. He has seen that in his eyes before, but this time instead of passing so quickly, it decides to linger, enough for Kaveh to finally put a name to it.
It’s hurt.
Alhaitham looks hurt, and Kaveh’s breath stutters at the sight. So uncharacteristic, so out of place on Alhaitham’s usual dispassionate expression. And when he finally replies, there’s an edge to his voice that Kaveh has never heard before.
“Because you’re graduating soon.”
“What?” Kaveh’s brows furrow. “What kind of reason is that?” He doesn’t mean for the words to come out so irritated, but they do. He doesn’t even know what exactly he’s annoyed at. Alhaitham, for making a joke out of his question. Himself, for— “Because I’m graduating soon? Archons, I— what, you thought I’d make fun of you or something? So now that I’ll be out of your life—”
Alhaitham inhales so sharply at the words, Kaveh has to suddenly stop short.
“If you don’t want to help me, then just say so.” His voice is clipped now, and Kaveh has always thought Alhaitham always speaks without emotion, but the way he sounds now, it’s like an education to complete apathy.
“That’s not—”
“Just leave if you’re not going to be of help anyway, senior Kaveh.”
For over a year now, Kaveh has pestered Alhaitham relentlessly about respecting his seniority as a joke, trying to get him to call him senior again, but now that he’s finally doing so, Kaveh feels far from a winner. Instead it’s like he’s losing a game he doesn’t even know he’s been playing.
“Haitham…”
Alhaitham scoffs, but his expression is far from amused or even indignant. He just looks hurt and resigned. “Or stay. Do whatever the fuck you want, since you’re so used to getting your way with me all the time, anyway.”
Kaveh stares at him, breathing hard, feeling like he’s trying not to drown with no idea how he got into the water in the first place. What has he done? What is happening? And what is that even supposed to mean? He’s been in countless fights with Alhaitham before, even ones that end with them not speaking for at most days at a time. But they have always been about petty, ridiculous things. Never about something like this.
Alhaitham is refusing to look back at him, a hard set in his jaw that Kaveh has never seen before.
Never something that leaves Kaveh’s chest feeling like it’s been carved raw and open.
He takes a deep breath and quietly leaves the room.
🌅
Kaveh wanders around the city aimlessly, the harsh afternoon sun beating down his back. He bears it, though, because the discomfort at least offers a little respite from the ache in his chest.
A small part of him regrets not asking where Alhaitham was supposed to go on his date, while another recognises that maybe it’s for the better he has no idea.
He kept picturing running into them— Alhaitham and this faceless man who is not Kaveh, and maybe Alhaitham would be frowning, and Kaveh would walk up to them and wail about Alhaitham’s cat being rushed to the Bimarstan, to return all the favours Alhaitham did him before and also to maybe spread the rumour that he’s a cat person. Or maybe Alhaitham would be smiling, his face split wide open in a way Kaveh has never made him smile before. The mental image itself makes him want to hurl right there on the street.
Fuck! How can he be so stupid? It’s just so laughably cliche of him, isn’t it? To realise his dumb stupid fuckass feelings for his best friend the moment he has someone else in his life.
He bites his lip, hard enough to make the physical hurt overwhelm the one in his heart. Belatedly, he realises he’s crying again when he feels cool tears run down his cheeks, instantly evaporating in the heat of the sun. Archons, who even goes on a damn date in the middle of a sweltering afternoon? Alhaitham and whoever’s the perfect soulmate he found who’s not Kaveh, probably.
Kaveh keeps walking in no particular direction and no particular Alhaitham to follow, but it seems like Alhaitham has become a built-in compass in him anyway, because soon Kaveh finds himself back at the Akademiya, walking through the clean white walls and bland grey carpet of the Haravatat student quarters, stopping in front of a nondescript door in a hall full of nondescript doors that he only recognises because of how his stupid heart has come to make the walls beyond it its home.
It’s not the same room he was waiting in front of, all those years ago when he first met Alhaitham, but nostalgia still hits Kaveh hard when he drops down on the carpet and leans heavily against the wall. It feels like a lifetime ago now— that slow sunset, the annoying freshman roommate of a long-forgotten ex-boyfriend that he didn’t know would be such a fixture in his life years down the road.
It’s been a while since the last time he’s had to wait alone in this hallway. It’s been a while since he felt alone.
Kaveh is not sure what he’ll do once Alhaitham comes back. Apologise, probably, if Alhaitham lets him. It will suck, and it will hurt— having to see Alhaitham be happy with somebody else, but at the end of the day he is Kaveh’s best friend first, and right now Kaveh just wants to make things right, even though he doesn’t have a single clue on just how to do it.
He doesn’t know how long he’s been waiting, but the next thing he knows he’s waking up with a crick in his neck from falling asleep against his knees and his eyes are opening to the sight of the dull hallway awash in golden light. For a moment he wonders if this is what it’s like to dream, even though no one dreams in Sumeru, because for a moment it feels like he’s back to that night all those years ago, discovering sunset in Haravatat for the first time.
When the footsteps come, it doesn’t come from somewhere to his right or even anywhere in the hallway, it comes from behind Kaveh— beyond the door next to the wall he’s leaning into. The door slowly creaks open, just like all those damn years ago, and Kaveh looks up to see Alhaitham’s face.
“What are you doing here?”
Kaveh sits up and winces, placing a hand to his nape and rolling his head to work out the cramp in his muscle. “Haitham, I— when did you get home?”
“I never left.” Alhaitham crosses his arms and stares down at him, face expressionless except for the tiny hint of confusion in his eyes. “How long have you been waiting?”
The words serve to fully wake Kaveh as he sits up straight and then braces his arms for balance as he makes himself stand up and meet Alhaitham’s gaze. “You— what? But your date—”
“Obviously, I never went.”
“Why?”
Alhaitham lets out a tired sigh, and Kaveh sees a crack in his expression. The same hurt from earlier crosses his face again, and Kaveh so badly wants to reach out and smooth it out of him.
“Because I’m not really interested in him, and it would be a disservice to both of us to pretend he could ever have a piece of my heart when someone else has already claimed the whole damn thing.”
It’s probably the most poetic thing that has ever come out of Alhaitham’s lips, and Kaveh opens his mouth uselessly, wanting to say something but not making sense of the garbled thoughts in his brain to come up with anything.
“Haitham…” he whispers instead, as one thing suddenly comes to the forefront of his mind. “What did you mean when you said, ’because you’re graduating soon’?”
A choked sound comes out of Alhaitham’s throat, so uncharacteristic in its vulnerability. “You’ve always been able to read between the lines of whatever I say, so why make me spell it out this time, senior Kaveh?”
“Stop calling me that.”
It’s so unfair— how the sun decides to take its time again today, making everything its light touches orange-golden, making sure this moment will forever be imprinted in Kaveh’s memory. It’s so beautiful, and it’s so unfair— how it lands perfectly on Alhaitham’s face, making sure Kaveh will never look at another sunset the same way again. Maybe he hasn’t, not since that very first night.
“I thought I had a chance, all these years,” Alhaitham says, and Kaveh can almost hear how he struggles to keep his voice level. “And yet you’ve never seen me as anything but your junior whom you love to pester, so why not? You’re graduating soon, and you said it yourself— you’ll be out of my life then. Can’t wait to get out of the shackles of the Akademiya and pursue what you truly love, can you? Except you never seem to know what exactly that is. All I know is that it’s not me, and it will never be me, so I figured that all these years of waiting around and hoping you’ll look at me as someone beyond the pesky little freshman you met that day is enough. You can’t wait to leave everything behind so why should I not get the chance to move on, too?”
“Haitham—” Kaveh barely hears the name come out of his lips with the roaring in his ears, the thundering drum of his heartbeat, begging to be let out of his chest.
“Please don’t fucking cry, I already feel terrible enough as it is.”
“Can you just shut up so I won’t?!” Kaveh gets out through warbling lips, but it’s too late anyway, because apparently the tears he cried out earlier on the street aren’t the last ones in his reservoir for the day. “I never— that was a joke. Gods. You think graduation excites me? I’m fucking scared, Alhaitham. I have no idea how to survive out in what they call the real world. Here in the Akademiya I can be as idealistic as I want and sure, you fucking Haravatats may scoff at me for it, but ultimately I get to be surrounded by like-minded people and go to my classes where passion is appreciated and work on the things I love and get high marks for it. Outside of these walls, I— I have no idea how to keep dreaming in a nation that can’t dream, Haitham. I have no idea what I would do with a life where I have to take more than a hundred steps to get to your door. I have no idea how I survived before I met you, and I sure as hell have no idea what to do if you kick me out of your life!”
Kaveh braces an arm against the wall, trying to catch his breath, trying to catch his hurt. Everything feels too quiet for a moment, and Kaveh expects the silence to be broken by Alhaitham’s rigid voice— breaking down what he said and tearing down every sentence into pieces like he does for all their arguments, but instead what he gets is a pair of arms gently encircling him, pulling him into a steady chest, betrayed by the erratic beating of the thing inside it.
“I love you,” he hears, and feels the vibration of the words straight to his core. “Don’t you still get it? I love you and I’m in love with you. How could you think I could ever kick you out of my life and not maim myself in the process?”
Kaveh feels a pathetic sob wrenched out of him, immediately subdued by the feeling of Alhaitham burying his face in his hair, his lips pressing a soft kiss upon the side of his head. How stupid. How utterly stupid, to go through all those wrong dates and wrong feelings for the wrong people just for an excuse to seek comfort from Alhaitham, when he could have had this right from the start instead. He places a hand on Alhaitham’s chest and gently pushes him back, not to let go, but just enough to look him in the eye and see for himself that he means all of it.
“Since when?”
A small smile almost quirks its way up Alhaitham’s lips, despite everything, but even now he purses them just to hide it. “Since I saw you looking like a helpless kitten outside my room.”
“Wh—” Kaveh pushes him further back and slaps a hand against his chest. “I did not look like a helpless kitten that day.”
“You’re right,” Alhaitham easily agrees, catching Kaveh off-guard not for the first time tonight. Not for the last time in his life. “I saw you, and how the sunset is bathing your face in an almost holy glow, and I thought about how for most scholars, the Akademiya is the closest they would ever have to a church, but— I’ve walked through these walls and saw countless sunsets from that window before, but until that day, I have never felt more religious.”
The sun has almost fully set now, casting a dark orange halo in the hall around them. They just look at each other for a while, and as the last traces of the sunset fade around them, Kaveh thinks he gets exactly what he means.
“You insufferable dork,” he sobs out, and is surprised to realise he’s yet again crying. “You can’t just say that and not kiss me. You can’t—”
Kaveh doesn’t get to say anything more, because Alhaitham tips his chin and leans down, capturing his lips and catching for himself any other words that might slip out of Kaveh’s mouth. Alhaitham smiles against the kiss, wide and open, and Kaveh is for a moment irked that this idiot really would only deign to smile like that when Kaveh can’t see him.
”I’ve waited for you out here for hours, you know,” is the first thing Kaveh says, breathless, the moment they pull away.
Alhaitham just pulls him closer. “Good. I’ve waited longer.”
🌅
“Why didn’t you ever say anything?” Kaveh asks later, his fingers tracing an aimless path around the back of Alhaitham’s hand.
Alhaitham stares at him for a moment, like the answer should be obvious. “I didn’t think I have a chance, and I like to minimise losses whenever I could.”
“A chance?” Kaveh scoffs. There’s only ever been you— the words surprise him as they come to him, stumbling over one another in his mind, bringing with them a heavy realisation.
Huh.
Kaveh smiles as he reaches a hand up to cup Alhaitham’s cheek, the telltale beating of his heart telling him that it’s true. Right from the very first day, hasn’t the universe given him all his clues? “I love you. Sorry it took me a while.”
It took Kaveh years to piece them together, but it’s all so obvious now—
Here, a golden sunset. In the exact colour you’ve always thought love would look like.
There, a boy. Guess what role he will play in your life?